Change your habits before meddling with nature's

Bravo to the people who attended the meeting about poisoning the birds who are eating the plover eggs! There are many people who feel the same, but cannot attend meetings due to work schedules.

Why is it that humans feel they can manipulate nature and shape it to meet only human needs? We reroute rivers or dam them so we can have water when and where we want it. We drill, mine and blast holes in the earth to reach coal, oil, gold, silver, or other gems and ores. We pollute our air, water, dirt, rivers and oceans with our "garbage." We think that if we bury or hide our toxic, electronic, radioactive or fill-in-the-blank waste, that it's OK.

We clear-cut our forests (carbon traps) and pave over great portions of our dirt. We pump toxins into the natural or manmade fissures in the earth and then wonder why our water sources become polluted and unusable. We water lawns that we plant and then spray toxins on the grass to kill "weeds."

We fill swimming pools and waste lots of water when some people cannot get enough water to drink, or have to walk miles to get it. We think we can do whatever we want and buy lots of things we do not need without regard to the long-term consequences of our behaviors.

We eat and drink and smoke things that compromise our health, even when we know it, then expect others to make us well again. Then we expect others who work to give us money to live because we are too lazy to do anything to support ourselves, or don't feel like doing any sort of "work" in exchange for the free ride. We continue with our addictions and our comfortable habits with little concern for the children we affect, the animals we kill, or the Earth we are leaving for future generations.

There is only one planet that we know of that supports life, and we are ruining it with our lifestyles. People are either ignorant of what is happening, in denial of reality (e.g. no global warming), or refuse to act because they feel nothing they can do can make a change.

The animals, weather, plants, water sources (salt or fresh) are all giving us signs -- telling us they and therefore we are in dire straits. There are no inexpensive remedies now. Future jobs will be in getting the natural environments clean, inventing ways to undo what man has done to the earth, educating people in ways to live with nature rather than living to overcome or change it, keeping as few man-made items as we can in circulation (no more planned obsolescence), letting go of our need for more and more, newer styles, fast foods, fast cars, fast living.

Our lifestyle, our culture is what is killing fish, birds, salamanders, frogs, bats, small birds, bees, whales, coral reefs, trees and many other species. It's bringing serious health issues to younger and younger people as well.

Let the birds alone. Change our own behaviors and practices or we won't be saving any endangered species -- including ourselves.